


The Eyes of Blenheim: Chapter Five

by itstonedme



Series: The Eyes of Blenheim [5]
Category: Lord of the Rings RPF
Genre: AU, Edwardian Period, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-01
Updated: 2014-02-01
Packaged: 2018-01-10 20:10:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,430
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1163972
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/itstonedme/pseuds/itstonedme
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Orlijah meets <i>Downton Abbey</i>.  The year is 1905.  Orlando is the 9th Duke of Marlborough, married to the beautiful Olivia, with two children.  Elijah is his personal valet, a minister's son.<br/><b>Credits:</b> Enormous thanks to  for creating the banner for this series located on LJ <a href="http://itstonedme.livejournal.com/94189.html">here</a>.</p><p>Disclaimer:  Fiction.  No disrespect intended to any living persons.</p><p>Feedback: Always appreciated</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Eyes of Blenheim: Chapter Five

**Chapter 5**

It is coming upon two in the morning when Orlando quietly lets himself into his hotel suite, driven to it only because if he lingers any longer in the gentlemen's lounge, he is at risk of becoming even more maudlin than he already is. Several fellows had sat with him to share their drinks and conversation, but all were about as useless as he in forming a coherent discourse, and all were avoiding going to their rooms over something, whether it was a wife or a worry. There was one fellow who delicately sought Orlando's interest in perhaps joining him in his room, but Orlando managed to extricate both himself and the gentleman in question from further embarrassment without acknowledging that either of them had any notion of what they were really talking about. Only after Orlando had nodded off briefly as he sat alone in his chair did he realize that staying any longer might risk chatter among the waiters, and Orlando is sober enough to know that once the help starts chattering, he might as well ask the city newspapers to print that the Duke of Marlborough is a sot. 

There is a lamp on over by the window when he opens the door, but Elijah, who had promised to wait up, has not. He is asleep on the sofa, feet still on the floor but his upper body folded against the chesterfield's arm. The noise of the door awakens him, and he begins to rouse but slowly, disoriented from the depth of sleep he has to leave behind.

"You should be in bed," Orlando says quietly, placing his hat and gloves onto the console near the door. He sees Elijah shifting to stand. "Don't get up," he says, walking across the room to a nearby arm chair and settling heavily into it. He notices the Wilde book on the centre table in front of the sofa. There'll be no conversation tonight. He wonders what he was even thinking, suggesting that Elijah read it. What a fool he's been. 

Elijah pulls his watch from his vest pocket. "The play and dinner went well?" he asks, unaware that he's yawned.

"Very," Orlando replies quietly. "A success all around."

The room takes on a silence that a room possesses only when the night is deep. Over on the demilune between the windows, the clock ticks loudly, presently accompanied by the resounding gurgle of Elijah's stomach.

"I hope that doesn't mean you forewent dinner," Orlando murmurs.

"Pardon, Your Grace," Elijah says, placing his hand over his midsection, "and no." He gets to his feet. "The pub served surprisingly decent fare. I am thirsty, though. A drink, Your Grace?"

"Whatever you are having," Orlando replies distractedly, staring off to the side.

Elijah walks to the sideboard and pours two glasses of water. Even though he's half asleep, the duke stinks of smoke and liquor, and pouring water into him can only serve well for the morrow. He drains his own glass and comes over to hand the other to Orlando, who looks up at him, his head rolling against the chair back, eyes glistening in the low light. 

Elijah frowns. "May I ask if everything is all right, Your Grace?" 

Orlando reaches for the glass with his right hand, but before Elijah can release it, the duke clutches Elijah's wrist with his other hand and holds it still. He does not look at Elijah, and the two become frozen, Elijah's heart racing. Slowly Orlando takes the glass away and draws Elijah's hand to his cheek, holding it there before turning and kissing it. 

Elijah's breath catches, but he does not pull away.

"Oh God," Orlando groans, immediately releasing him. "Forgive me, Elijah. I'm drunk. I don't know what I'm doing." 

Elijah cannot move. He is inundated with alarm and confusion and compassion at Orlando's distress. "Perhaps you need to retire, Your Grace," he says helpfully, quietly. "Let's get you to bed."

"Yes," Orlando chokes out, smiling, eyes glittering as he looks up once more at Elijah. "Perhaps you are right." He sets the glass on the drum table next to his chair but makes no effort to move.

"Here," Elijah says, kneeling at his feet. "Let's start with your shoes." 

"You must think me a fool. Or worse," Orlando says, looking down as Elijah works his laces. 

"Never, Your Grace. Not even when you've spent the night drinking far more than you are accustomed to. You should drink that water," he nods towards the glass.

"Don't," Orlando moans.

Elijah looks up. "Don't what, Your Grace?"

"Don't excuse how I've insulted you."

Elijah lowers his head and works to unlace the other shoe, cupping Orlando's heel to slide the shoe off. "I was not insulted, Your Grace. It was…a kindness on your part."

"You know what it was, Elijah," Orlando whispers. "I suspect you now know what I am."

This revelation thunders through Elijah, but he does not show it. "You are drunk and tired and sad from all the upset you've been through lately, Your Grace," he says, removing the other shoe and setting the pair beside the chair. No matter that he thinks otherwise, he will not allow His Grace to lose face to his valet. 

"Don't call me that. Not, not tonight."

Elijah looks up quickly. "What would you wish me to call you?" he asks.

Orlando shakes his head and leans forward, his hands sweeping up through his hair as he hangs his head. "I'm a mess, Elijah," he says brokenly. "Perhaps you should leave now. Go to bed." He begins to weep, not the quiet snuffles of a minor breakdown, but the sound of a pained spirit trying with futility to contain his anguish. 

Elijah does not know what to do. He reaches up to grip Orlando's hand. Orlando cries even harder and lifts the fingers to his lips, briefly kissing them before returning them to his lap where he clutches them, bereft.

The sounds of sorrow in the empty room are infinitely shocking and sad to Elijah. "It will work out," he says urgently. "You will find a way." 

"It's hardly a secret now, is it," Orlando laughs bitterly through his tears. "And I am so tired of it being so, of having to hide what I am, of never living in comfort with another who understands. Why is the state of my being such a sin, Elijah? I did not choose these desires. Oh, God," he sobs.

Elijah grips his hand tighter. As strong as the urge is, it is not his place to embrace His Grace, to give solace as he would his brother or his father. It is not his place, and yet he wishes it were. 

"You read the book," Orlando continues, nodding towards the table, words hitching between breaths. "Even Wilde deemed his wretched state a 'perversion.' How is it that God made me this way? Tell me, Elijah." 

"God only asks that we love," Elijah whispers. "He does not tell us whom or how."

Orlando searches Elijah's eyes earnestly. "Do you believe that?" he whispers hopefully. Elijah is a parson's son. Surely he must be privy to God's teachings better than his own miserable self.

"Yes," Elijah smiles, nodding. "I do, most fervently." 

"You do not regard me with horror?" Orlando asks.

"Never," Elijah smiles kindly, tightening his grip. "There is nothing horrible about what you feel towards…other men. It is not unnatural. It is only uncommon."

"And you, Elijah," Orlando whispers. "Are your own feelings common or…not?"

Elijah withdraws his hand from Orlando's and looks down. This is not a conversation he knows how to have because it would mean admitting to things he has never honestly formulated. "I don't truly know my own feelings," he says quietly. "I've never really tested them one way or the other."

Orlando stares at Elijah's downturned head. Even in his sorrow, there is a sweetness to the thought of Elijah being untouched, unlearned. "Not with a young woman from your village? Surely the parson's son was regarded as a promising acquisition."

Elijah shrugs, still not looking up. "I suppose," he admits. "There were a few young ladies who spent time in my company. But it never led anywhere. A few kisses, hands held."

"And?" 

"And then it would tail off. There was no interest, it seemed."

"On whose part?"

Elijah's face has begun to redden. "I, I suspect it was mine."

Orlando says nothing, just continues to watch as Elijah kneels silently before him. "We are a pair," he finally sighs. "Both denying our lot in life."

Elijah slowly pushes himself to his feet. Yes, he supposes that this is exactly what he has done, although he has chosen to frame it as a lack of interest. He loves his family; they are enough. "Come, Your Grace. You should retire. It is late."

Orlando reluctantly rises, smearing his hands over his wet cheeks and sighing audibly, breaths hitching. 

Orlando still seems too fragile for Elijah to wish to sever the charity of the moment. "Here," he says, slipping one arm around Orlando's back and lifting an arm over his shoulder. "Let me help you."

Orlando molds himself to Elijah. "I'm not drunk," he says with utter exhaustion. "I could walk on my own." But the moment is gratefully comforting; Elijah smells and feels sympathetic and real, perhaps the only person who could ever show understanding to him at this moment without wanting something from him in return, something costly, something damaging. 

"I know," Elijah replies. "But you _are_ unbearably sad and tired." 

When they arrive in the bedroom, Elijah sits Orlando at the foot of the bed and strips the pillows before turning back the bedding. Orlando peels off his jacket, letting it fall behind him on the spread. He begins to unbutton his waistcoat, fingers slow and labored. 

Elijah glances at him and straightens. "Give me your wrist," he says, and begins to uncuff first one shirt sleeve and then the other. 

When he's done, Orlando removes his waistcoat and sits quietly, but his eyes have filled again. He tries to laugh. "I can't seem to stop crying." 

"I suppose this has been a long time coming," Elijah says, placing the links in his vest pocket and pulling Orlando's white bow to untie it. He lays it on the bed and begins unfastening the shirt buttons. 

"You are being very kind," Orlando says.

Elijah folds Orlando's suspenders down each arm. "Your trousers, Your Grace."

Orlando stands and begins to unfasten the buttons at his waist, sliding the trousers down over his hips. 

"Sit," Elijah says quietly and he bends to pull the fabric free of Orlando's legs. "All right, into bed." He scoops up the discarded garments while Orlando crawls beneath the covers.

"Elijah," Orlando says while the clothes are being hung. "Would it be asking too much for you to sit with me, just until I fall asleep? Forget that you are my valet and tell me honestly if you would rather not. I will not think less of you."

Elijah closes the armoire. "Of course, Your Grace," he replies, for it is the very least he can do. It is only when Orlando shifts to make room in the bed that Elijah fully understands the request. It is such a strange state of affairs that he has found himself in that he acts with as much detached protocol as with wit. He unties his laces and toes off his shoes, climbing onto the bed, his back against the headboard, legs atop the bedding. Orlando nestles up against his thigh and Elijah, at a loss as to where to put his hand, rests it on the pillow above Orlando's head.

"I fear that in the morning, I will not be able to even look at you," Orlando says, "such will be my shame at how I have behaved tonight." 

Elijah looks down. He is filled with the urge to stroke Orlando's hair, to soothe him as if it were the young Lord Andrew at his side rather than his father. "Shhh," he says. "You need not worry."

"I fear that one day very soon, I will find that my indiscretion has complicated your life unnecessarily and that you have up and left for fortunes elsewhere." He is quiet for a moment. "That would sadden me greatly, Elijah." 

"It is no burden," Elijah says. "And it would sadden me too. I have come to view my place in your household with great contentment."

They are both quiet.

"But surely," Orlando says, so quietly Elijah has to strain to hear him, "you must have now come to understand my feelings for you. This is not just a matter of my affection for men, Elijah. My affection is for you."

Elijah is quiet, thoughtful, reflecting back on a hundred moments between them that he now views very differently, moments in which Orlando has tried to burrow closer to Elijah, to close the gap that society has put between them on so many different levels. He considers how these reflections do not come with any great surprise, only a gradual understanding. "I know," he finally says.

"And so now, through no fault on your part, I have put you in what must be an insufferable situation." 

Elijah can begin to glimpse his future, one of hopelessness and complication and inevitable dismissal. It is terrifying, and nothing about it seems improbable, only eventual. But there is another future that glitters around the edges, one of hope and fulfillment and joy. His mind tracks back and forth between them, between an employer who wishes to bed him, an employer with a wife and children, an employer who holds his livelihood and a scandal in his hands. All of that thrown up against an employer who wishes to put social barriers aside, who offers love and need, who stands to lose far more than Elijah might. It must be a powerful desire, Elijah thinks, one that Elijah has not allowed himself to feel. And yet, for his own part, what concerns him more than all the possible destruction that could result are his own inadequacies in pleasing Orlando on any level. And it is this lack of experience, of not having anything to offer in return, that unsteadies him. That this should be the only aspect of the situation that concerns him is most surprising of all.

"It would be insufferable," he finally says, "if my personal immaturity meant that I were unable to match your passion in return."

Orlando looks up as Elijah sighs heavily. "Your innocence, you mean? Is that what you really feel?" 

The moment hangs between them in silence. "I don't know," Elijah says, looking across the room, unable to meet Orlando's eyes. He frowns. "I don't know," he repeats in frustration. "I wish I did. I wish I were as certain as you in knowing what you are and what you feel. I sometimes think that I'm not meant to know, that this part of life is meant to pass me by, that others may know what being loved is all about but not me."

Orlando shifts up onto his elbow. "What are you saying? Not twenty minutes ago you told me that this was God's purpose, for all of us. Look at me, Elijah. Are you saying that you don't feel yourself worthy of being loved?"

Elijah looks at him but says nothing.

"That is ridiculous," Orlando says with a small laugh. "You have so much to offer. You are kind and clever and true."

Elijah shifts on the bed, but inwardly he is squirming. He looks away.

"Don't be like that," Orlando says kindly. "You are exceedingly attractive. Not simply in your appearance but in your person. It's just a matter of you not knowing that about yourself."

No one has ever said such things to Elijah. His expression fades into one of wistful longing.

"You just need to believe that it is possible for yourself." 

Elijah closes his eyes and nods.

"I wish we weren't so tired," Orlando says, sinking back down, his head against Elijah's thigh. "I wish we could talk about this far into the night. You have been a friend to me tonight, Elijah, and in all sincerity, I want to be a friend to you in return. I would like to think we could speak of this again, that come the morning, we won't slide back into our formality and pretend it never happened. Could that be possible?"

"Yes," Elijah says tiredly.

"You have comforted me more than you know, and I hope in some small way, I have been able to do the same. You will stay with me until I'm asleep? You won't leave?"

"Of course," Elijah says, weariness settling over him like an armoured coat. He removes his eyeglasses and pinches the bridge of his nose. Setting his glasses on the side table, he reaches for the bed lamp and pulls the chord.

And long after Orlando has fallen asleep, Elijah sits in the dark, replaying the night, unable to let the heaviness of his body master the churning of his mind. So much hangs by a single thread, a single choice. In some ways, he now sees that his whole life has led to this moment and that Orlando has been merely the vehicle that drove him to the crossroad. If he denies making that choice, things are forever changed. If he makes that choice, things are forever changed. It is only a matter of which changes are the ones he wants to live with. He cannot fault Orlando for having set this course, for he knows that Orlando is as much beholden to circumstance as he is. The two of them are what they are. 

As he feels Orlando's slow, even breaths rise and fall beside him, Elijah's fingers blindly creep to find his hair, and he curls one lock around a finger and hangs on. 

*

Orlando's dream is a montage of images, of deserts and mirages, of palm-lined pools that disappear once he flies through the air to reach them. He senses that he is not searching alone. But whomever it is that travels with him remains unseen, unheard. When he turns to discover his companion, there is only a black void, like an ocean promontory on a moonless night, hovering in the air where the sweltering dessert sky should be. But he knows that this unknown person is within it, hidden but close, hidden but constantly there. 

And then he awakes and the dream evaporates, to be forever forgotten.

Orlando sits up. He is parched, and his mouth tastes of ashes, his breath foul. He senses that he has been asleep perhaps two hours, no more. 

He remembers how he fell asleep and immediately looks to his left. There, captured in the low light that spills from the still-illuminated sitting room, Elijah lies fast asleep atop the covers, curled on his side towards him. 

He folds back the covers, laying the top spread across Elijah and gets out of bed on the far side so that he find himself a glass of water. He pads into the sitting room for the tumbler Elijah poured him only a few hours before and drains it, pouring another from the pitcher on the side board. A host of crystal decanters populate the surface, each with a pewter collar labelling its contents, and Orlando reads through them, selecting a fruit brandy which he unstops and sniffs, emptying a small amount into his glass. He swills his mouth with the alcohol before swallowing. It is syrupy sweet, and he winces, pouring another short glass of water so that he might rinse again. Then he extinguishes the lamp and creeps back into the bedroom, slipping silently between the sheets. 

He lies facing Elijah, but with the room now in full darkness, he cannot discern him. He can only imagine what he sees, what he has seen for months, what he saw the first moment Elijah arrived in his study to interview for his position: feathered eyelashes against alabaster skin, lips classically thin, a narrow perfectly formed nose, brows that now must be perfectly framing the orbs of his shuttered eyes. Everywhere, perfection and beauty. He curses the night for denying his unguarded study, for denying him this moment when he finally has Elijah all to himself. He pulls the bedding under his chin and releases himself once more to sleep.

*


End file.
